“Asian Countries Take the U.S. to School” is a thoughtful education article from The Atlantic. While I disagree with some of the arguments presented, such as the necessity of a common curriculum, I agree with the author that maintaining high expectations for all students is key.
Author Marc Tucker writes,
If the key advantage enjoyed by disadvantaged students in these Asian countries is the conviction that all students can perform at high levels, then the main obstacle faced by disadvantaged students in the United States is the high degree to which different expectations for students from different educational backgrounds are embedded in our culture.
…
The experience of the East Asian countries shows what can happen if policy is based on the assumption that all children can learn at high levels. And it shows, in detail, how policy has to change to make that possible. The high proportion of low performers in the United States is not a function of poverty. It is a function of our inability to act as if we actually believed the slogan we have long embraced in theory but not in practice: the idea that all children can learn.
High expectations cannot be divorced from their use of testing and other accountability measures to assess student performance. I also get the sense that Asian countries see schools as educational institutions, rather than places that disseminate various social and political ideologies.
